The tomoe, a sacred symbol in Japan that is sometimes used by the far-right. Mitsukai at the English language Wikipedia.

As a Shintoist, and especially a non-Japanese Shintoist, I feel I should talk about a very real problem that exists in the Shinto community – its past and present ties with the far-right in Japan. [Read more]

4 responses to “The Ugly Side of Politicised Shinto”

Etymologically a nation is an enlarged family. And the world is composed of a whole spectrum of nations. That what makes the beauty of the world. Why would you force Shinto to pretend to universalism. Shinto is a national religion and the expression of a race. Other races may hold their own animist traditions. I am thinking about ancient Greece. Especially pre-Socratic. Or African animism though not as developped and refined as european and asians traditions. Shinto sharing elements with foreign traditions such as vedic scriptures do not change the fact that it beholds a unique character of japaneseness.

The japanese and asians in general are pragmatic people. Their cultural foundations making them genuinely insensitive to the western “melting-pot propaganda”. They want to keep their identity and you refuse to respect that. It is not about “refusing to embrace” but being able to distinguish apples from oranges.

What you preach for is not love. It is political propaganda. Shinto cultivates the sense of harmony. So is japanese social order. And the roots of it lies in japaneseness. This is absolutely obvious to anyone having some sense of observation.

The question is not to know if Shinto have the power to embrace foreign people. The question is if it should. And it shouldn’t. Free to you and me to inspire ourselves from Shinto elements. But this religion as a whole is obviously ethnic-centered. Having at its very core Their soil, Their ancestors and Their divine Emperor.

“and I was shocked to come across a group of anti-Muslim Druids on Facebook not so long ago. No religion is safe from extremism.”

Who said that being anti-Islam is being extremist. The TV ? Sunni Islam is a highly political religion based on the law of god (Sharia) and the Khalifa. You are with them or against them. Polytheists are amongst natural enemies of the Tawhid. The nuclear core of the Islamic faith. Khalifas have remained the same from Umar Khattab and the Ottomans to ISIS.

These pagan druids simply understood something you dont. If Islam would rule over Europe in a near future they would have to 1. submit or 2. be killed.